This is going to be a short post. So that you may actually read the entire thing and not just skim.
Its almost a month since I moved to Mumbai. And I still trying to figure out things. Part reason of that is that I have decided to live with a friends from college. And that means I am dependant on two more people to figure out shit. Even if they are understanding and independent, human courtesy says that I need to include them in whatever I decide. So for example, despite a frantic house search, I we haven’t been able to close on a place where I we would live. This, for the record, is against my DNA. I am like that lone mercenary who wants to remain independent and live like his way, without regard to all the burden that comes from “belonging” to a faction.
The other part is that I am older and hence more inflexible. And that means there is another set of problems that I have. Taking the example of house, I want to live in a spacious, airy, clean, new house. Which, in Mumbai, dont exist. The ones that do, demand a rental of a million bucks a day, which I cant pay. In general, the inflexible me in finding it hard to adjust to madness in Mumbai. But then, there is no place like Mumbai, anywhere in the world and I have to go through the grind. And no, I am not enjoying this at all. May be like all oldies, I am averse to change and since “growing up” is a slow and gradual transition, I am consciously in the same space as a 25 year old but subconsciously I am now 30 and that means there is a constant conflict between my two sides.
So, changing tracks, this post is about what I do in my spare time, which in my case, I have in abundance. And I am at my wits end trying to figure out what to with it.
Let me talk about Delhi to give a perspective. In Delhi, for some reason, I always had something or the other to do. If nothing, I could remain holed up at home and flick tv channels and maybe watch some movie. If not that, my family has stayed at the same place for almost 20 years and I know every nook and cranny in that part of Delhi. I know most people and there is a sense of familiarity. I could go for a walk, or a smoke and get back feeling good about the camaraderie that I share with the place. There are tons of friends/acquaintances that I could meet at random and have a good time and come back. I had a social life in Delhi.
Mumbai on the other hand, I have been out of this place for more than 3 years. All my friends are now married, engaged or seeing someone. And that means I am not high on their priority list (25 yr old). And that means that they are busy on weekends with household chores and stuff. And that means that I can only see them for a window of an hour or so, rather than entire weeks that we spent together at one point in time. Dissonance. Then, when I was younger, I was a promising and rising young man and had irrational beliefs about thing. That made me pseudo popular and I could meet strangers and paddle my beliefs and spend time engaging in mental masturbation. Now, I am a senile old man and I have a tough time going out to meet strangers. I refuse to take part in political, activist movements and pseudo intelligent conversations do not excite me anymore. As a result, I am not popular at all.
I can now spend all my time either reading or writing. Which is not bad to be honest but if I could change it, I would love to do so. May be in next few months.